APRIL 2015
1 APRIL WEDS
Phat Boys for lunch with Greg today in Cornish. Great visit. Afterwards I took a short walk and fell into a delightful encounter with a guy in front of a big blue house where I had stopped to take some photos of the faded siding. Bo a musician, guitarist, and former teacher, I think. He and his wife Valerie are new to Cornish, opening an antique shop later this year. House of her aunt which she visited for thirty years. Will see if I can get over this summer and chat with him again.
Beautiful day. I thought maybe in a week with the off Saturday I could go all the way to Portland and demand a free cup of tea from Ray Marcotte.
News that Jerry Zinfon died yesterday. Prostate cancer Nancy says. Never knew he had been a Marine in Korea!
Thursday night April 2
Lamictal arrived, day early, on budget promised. Hooray. Good swim and then ReFresh for new do. Nice reply from John Sitter at Notre Dame:
Dear Bob,
Good to hear from you, Doktor Herr Professor Emeritus!
To your question: Here we have two doctoral exams. The first, based on reading lists, is not ceremonial; i.e., people do occasionally fail it, or sometimes part of it, and have to repeat. The 2nd, the dissertation defense, is ceremonial in the sense that the dissertation has already been deemed finished, perhaps pending minor corrections. There is conversation about strengths & shortcomings, the latter usually in the form of suggestions for what to do do before submitting parts for publication, etc.
So it depends mainly on which this is. But in any case, nodding mysteriously is a good bet.
All's well here. More of my energy is going into courses on literature & the environment and into a team-taught interdisciplinary course on sustainability. Or perhaps pre-disciplinary. I plan to do it a couple more years or until the planet has clearly been saved. Whichever comes first. We are trying to decide whether this will be where we retire. We like it, but each winter gets us browsing Atlanta real estate listings.
I hope this finds you well & thriving. I'm sure it will be gratifying to be in on your former student's doctoring. And there's a pretty good chance that in June the snows of Boston will finally be the snows of yesteryear.
All best,
John
------------
Friday
Short walk to break-in the Pearl Izumi EM Road N 2 v2
Step into to the meat-and-potatoes of the E:Motion collection. As a high-mileage, neutral trainer, the EM Road N 2 contains moderate cushioning. Unlike most traditional running shoes that feature a static heel-to-toe drop, the E:Motion collection has an always-changing drop that shifts as you move through your stride. It adapts to your body and propels you forward in an intuitive flow for a smoother, more efficient run. The result? A blend of excellent ground contact with a high-performance, responsive ride. The seam-free upper gives it an even more natural, skin-like feel.
this text from Runningshoes.com Took out the insole so might put them back later for a fuller test of the dynamic motion promised.
Is strange to go back from barefoot to padding. But maybe a good move, given recent scare about feet and legs and back. Good to stretch out the back on regular basis. Sitting at the computer no doubt a big factor.
Found the site that convinced me: running.competitor.com
best clear comparison discussions -- graphics and text --
on the Pearl
Incorporating less-is-more design principles while still offering enough cushioning, protection and energetic pop for a wide range of training runs and races, the updated N2 is the epitome of modern shoe design. The new seamless, one-piece stretchy mesh upper, enhanced by supportive but minimalistic heat-welded overlays, provides a supremely connective fit for all foot shapes. The updated, softer two-layer foam midsole improves great heel impact cushioning and bolsters the heel-toe flow of the shoe. Our wear-testers loved this shoe for its amazing agility, inherent stability and proprioceptive feeling for both slower and faster running. Although it has a good amount of cushioning, it doesn’t give off a mushy or even springy sensation—more of a moderate softness that serves up a responsive ride and allows for great feel for the ground. We tested both the neutral-oriented N2 and the light stability M2 model and preferred the N2 for the uninhibited smoothness it provides.
Best for: A variety of training runs and races from short to long and slower to faster.
weights: 9.6 oz. (men’s), 8.4 oz. (women’s)
heel-toe offset: 4mm; 23mm (heel), 19mm (forefoot)
Read more at http://running.competitor.com/2015/03/2015-running-gear-guide/2015-running-gear-guide-road-shoes_123444/8#Tz0seL4FPXuwC9Wr.99
so this shoe ADDS a 4mm rise-drop to my Barefoot feel and gait. Oh dear.
Easter Sunday night April 5
Overnight at the Fairmont on Copley. High winds. Otherwise sunny and bright and almost warmish. Dinner with Mike Farkas at Lolitas on Dartmouth and today dinner at the Atlantic Fish Co on Boylston.
Breakfast at the Oak Room in the hotel. Vaguely familiar. Did I stay there once on my own 12 years ago? Not impossible. We both think we had never stayed there. Looks wonderful. Refurbished a few years ago for the centenary. Turns out it is owned, ultimately, by Saudi Arabia kingdom! Canadian management.
Music at Trinity as per traditions.
Monday night April 6
Va felt bad again last night so we called Larson and drove there, arrived at 10 but phoned and they couldn’t see us until 4. Lunched, shopped, goute-ed, Larson is ordering an e e g and a cat scan just to see if the shunt has moved and if it needs to be re-set.
Dr Albert Day or Alfred Day ? at Brigham and Women’s, retired back to Texas now. Sent a great letter to us when he did. Va remembered that. I had forgotten until she mentioned it.
Shoes galore. Wore the Mizumis today. oops Izumi. Feet did thank me even though they feel tight and pinchey and a wee high. Four others arrived today.
Maybe shoe obsession goes back to wanting to be on the basketball team like my older brother, wanting to be a jock while knowing that would never, could never, happen.
Four pair of new shoes at once! Yikes. manic-d? All are blue and gold, florescent green-gold. Might get away with not being noticed quite. Will see. Might have to invoke the Chase rewards angle. Free books, free shoes??
Finished Iyer’s book on Blanchot. Early effort. Lots of good stuff but lacking, finally, in real explanatory power. Not far enough back from Blanchot. Goes in circles, repeats, pastes in clumps, ambitious and bright but not yet fully formed. Will take a look at the second book but might not give it much attention for now. Back to more direct work on Bataille.
Discovered a new American writer in bookforum. Goyen, William Goyen. Friend of Katherine Anne Porter et al. How did I never hear of him??
New Balance Zante
heel-toe offset: 6mm; 16mm (heel), 10mm (forefoot) 6mm
HAVE NOT worn these yet.
Read more at http://running.competitor.com/2015/03/2015-running-gear-guide/2015-running-gear-guide-road-shoes_123444#k8gP4TtAbb5JeIrg.99
Today I did wear the ON Cloudsters. 7mm ! yikes. I could feel it. This was the day in Newburyport and Exeter. Gray, overcast after a short sunny start.
The Altras heel-toe offset: 0mm; 26mm (heel), 26mm zero mm
these are the Altra superior trail I think
Read more at http://running.competitor.com/2015/03/2015-running-gear-guide/2015-running-gear-guide-road-shoes_123444/27#t43SLoB0KwUpPvGl.99
Pearl
Altra
ON
NB Zante
Altra 0 zero mm
Pearl 4 mm
Zante 6 mm
On 7 mm
seems like there is a fifth--have to go check the closet
could include the Lems leather shoes I guess
now I’m disappointed not to have bought a 5th new shoe! talk about obsession!
running site reminds us to look at basketball shoes---always zero-drop, always rational in padding and structure.
on Exeter to Phil----
Day started off pretty sunny but by the time I pulled into Exeter, 1pm, it had clouded over and gotten colder, so the place looked pretty gray. As soon as I walked around I felt like I was in the pages of A Separate Peace. Talked briefly with two kids, matchstick skinny, probably first or second year. One of them did know the name of the famous architect who designed the library I was there to see. Louis Kahn. I gave them a factoid to ponder--when he died everyone found out he had had two families in secret, hidden from each other. They laughed and paused to take that in. Corrupting the young!
Campus looks so impressive, as you say. It would have overwhelmed me and I could never have survived the translation you underwent. The place looks like Harvard should look. Coherent and artfully massed and huddled. Matched styles, red brick, white pillars. The lawns look beautiful in the summer and fall and the rest of the time so large as to be intimidating.
You think the campus took shape in the late
20s to the 40s? Dartmouth's library which copies
Independence Hall was finished in 1929. Exeter
had the good luck to have those buildings all built
within I'd say ten years of each other. ? Maybe
1930-40 for the kids whose parents knew the war was on its way?
On a bright sunny day in late spring it would be totally idyllic and beautiful and one could read Keats and Shelley and dream the good life. Lots of sports being played on the fields. There is a huge phys ed buiding as you know across the road as you drive in from the south (Seabrook). Added onto various times. One huge bunker like concrete thing.
The Kahn building became famous for sure because it photographs so damn well. And it was right at the end of the 50s I think and he got all the combinations of brick and concrete just right, exquisite scale, proportions, mystery, materials etc just right. He may have thought he was quoting the mills, sure, because then that huge block was a violent "insertion" into the rich lawns of privilege, sort of like the Centre Pompidou's tubular plumbing plopped into the heart of the old Marais. But at the same time Kahn gets all that brutal concrete to feel light and near-delicate with those huge circles and curves. Just looked it up. not completed until 1971 so by then Boston's brutalist city hall was surely under construction?
Anyway, as with all buildings one has seen so often only in photos, it looks and feel smaller at first encounter than you had expected and pleasantly human in scale. Almost, now, artisanal to use that terrible trendy term. And it captures the essence of what private libraries have felt like for centuries. The oak woodwork, the nooks and angles and play of light and texture plus the books themselves and the rigorous Order of the whole geometry keeping everything secure.
By the way it felt refreshingly like the world we grew up in in the sense that I parked on the street behind it, walked in, even photographed and chatted with the two students, walked into and all around the library and not one whiff of security. Library staff smiled pleasantly. Very nice. Not that way even at our campus.
Perhaps there are security cameras hidden in every square inch, but it still feels good to have that feeling. Money can buy that at least for a while longer, we can hope.
--------
photo with dictionary in window
That's looking directly at Webster Hall, which was the cool guys' dorm when I was there. I can't remember the name of the dorm to the left. I think this photo is taken from a window in the Kahn Library. Y? N?
yes. wrote the paragraph just sent earier today and now have
lost all my other precious obsv for a while. Didn't take time to
look up your specific sites. Warmer day for that. Frosty wind
had picked up.
You get a medal for having survived that transfer. How on earth
did you get there? Train to Boston and then the school picked you
up or did your parents drive you each time? Must have felt like
Siberia at least at times. Especially then, long before the town and
area had been gentrified in any way. Sorta like Plymouth in 1972 ! !
For years at the only grocery store around fresh produce was a
limp head of iceberg and a bunch of parseley if you were lucky to
get there each week in time.
Phil
Ah yes, the Main Academy Building. Abbott Hall, my dorm in my senior year, is slightly hidden by the pine tree. Again, I think this photo is take from near the Kahn Library. What did you think of it? Kahn said he took his inspiration from the old industrial-era buildings down along the Squamscott River in the town. I wonder why in hell he would do that and not take his inspiration from all the buildings on the campus. When I visited I also questioned the big hole in the lobby wall in the interior. I thought it might allow noise from the lobby to reach the stacks where students would be studying - or trying to study. I was assured by the head librarian that it didn't. Then again, she was the head librarian and not a student.
So what did you think of the place - New England picturesque or bleak or both?
--------------
so I did do the day as imagined, more or less. Mr India was not open but Jewel in the Crown served just as well. Now Saturday looms. Va goes off with PEO again as early as a quarter to eight! super early. Certainly gives me the time to go over to Portland if I want.
John Giono never replied back. So that’s that. Ray’s Dobra Tea room will be interesting enough. See what’s at the museum too?
-------
Phil
I was also able to walk thru the library with no one questioning me. Not true of dorms. In '62, no dorms were locked. Now they all are. Maybe because of co-ed now - at least in part. Don't want anyone raping any young girls I went into art building but was quickly questioned by teacher.
You're right that the place seems idyllic in the spring and fall (and, I assume, summer), but much bleaker in the winter. In fact, most of my memories are of bleakness. I also hated steam heat which I never mastered so I was always too hot or too cold (with a window cracked).
It was a terribly challenging change from LaSalle. I almost flunked a course that combined physics and chemistry, but managed to get c in math, low B in English and high B in French because I memorized everything.
Mom and Dad drove me up to Exeter the spring I was accepted to take placement exams. I got failure in Latin and 'bad failure' in math. So I dropped Latin & took French. And, because Exeter required only three years of math, I took sophomore math in my first year and junior math in my senior year. I took two years of French in my first year, and took 3rd year French in my senior year, thus graduating with minimum courses.
During my two years, I took train to Boston. Got a cab from South to North station and took Boston & Main train to Exeter. Walked to the campus with my bags. My parents then shipped a trunk of my clothes to me.
people magazine (via facebook from zen glow susan harubin) on
magician Penn Jillette’s weightloss
decided to do just that, spending December through March on an “extreme low-calorie program” in which he consumed about 1,000 calories daily and was able to lose an average of 0.9 lbs. a day.
Since reaching his goal weight on his birthday, March 5, Jillette has stopped restricting the amounts he eats, and instead follows Dr. Fuhrman’s Nutritarian diet – this means he consumes no animal products, no processed grains, and no added sugar or salt.
“I eat unbelievable amounts of food but just very, very, very healthy food,” says the magician.
His typical daily diet consists of an “enormous salad” with vinegar as dressing for lunch (he doesn’t usually eat breakfast) and a dinner consisting of 3 lbs. of greens and three servings of black or brown rice with a vegetable stew, along with lots of fruits for dessert (his favorite is “an enormous amount of blueberries with plain cocoa powder”) and vegetables with vinegar or Tabasco sauce as a snack.
“I could probably have a steak or a doughnut every couple of weeks, but I just haven’t felt like it,” says Jillette. “When you’re feeling as bad as I felt, and you go to feeling as good as I feel, the temptation to go back to doing what you were doing when you felt bad is not very great.”
--------now to check out Dr Fuhrman
3 lbs of greens! could I eat that in a day???
wiki Peter Lipson, a physician and writer on alternative medicine, has been heavily critical of Fuhrman's health equation, writing that since its terms cannot be quantified, it is "nothing more than a parlor trick".[4] Fuhrman created what he calls the "Aggregate Nutrient Density Index", a ranking of foods based on micronutrient concentration.
--------
McDougall: “I want to to win the war rather than every battle”. Traditionally, peasants ate brown rice. Yet many healthy starch-based populations have traditionally used white rice. If you must, go ahead and eat your white rice. Give up the grease, meat, and dairy, and eat the white rice. Clearly brown rice is the better choice between white and brown, but “I’d rather you ate white rice than meat and dairy.” White rice does NOT cause diabetes. Dr. Kempner’s rice diet which reversed diabetes was white rice and sugar.
Mackey: What is your opinion on beans vs. grains for starch?
McDougall: As beans are around 30% protein and too much protein can present a stress to the kidneys. Limit them to 1 cup a day to be on the safe side.
Fuhrman: Eat freely of beans, limit the grains.
At this point there was a short debate over the % of calories coming from protein in beans. McDougall had them at around 30%, Fuhrman placed them much lower.
Mackey: Are potatoes good or bad for us?
Fuhrman: It depends on the person. I you are overweight or diabatic, limit them. If not very active, limit. 35 studies show high glycemic load on sedentary overweight individuals promotes diabetes in some poeple.
McDougall: Glycemic index leads you in a false direction. Potatoes have a glycemic index of 100+. Snickers bars, are 68 on the glycemic index. Potato-based populations do not have diabetes or obesity.
Mackey: Nuts and seeds: How much is healthy? How much is too much?
Fuhrman: Overweight women should have no more than 1 oz. a day, overweight men no more than 2 oz. a day. Eat them with green vegetables at dinner to facilitate absorption. If you are slim, you can have more.
McDougall: In July, 2003 I wrote an article titled “What do I do if I lose too much weight?” Nuts can help you gain. Nuts are delicacies.
-----------
he usually doesn’t eat breakfast, lunch are the greens and dinner the starch --- blueberries dusted with chocolate sound great.
Kempner is the one who reversed diabetes with white rice and sugar!
Want to remember that. Probably we eat too many nuts. Va’s weight might be there?
------
Thursday night April 9
Snow this morning. Terrible flare-up of anal florescence--hemorrhoids. Blood a few days ago and not that now but just some itching and pain. Feel tonight like I have a fever or something deep inside. Quiet day because of the snow. Walking at Lowes in Tilton. Take-out from Thai Smile.
Reading Connor on Bataille. Quite good. Better than I had thought at first. Bataille worried that he was a “babbler.”
--------
Friday afternoon ---- dreary day, sick as a dog, in the gut, right after lunch. something I ate in Exeter, Indian, and day after, here, warm-ups of Indian and PEO leftovers and too many desserts, and last night, Thai Smile. All and whatever. Took stuff and napped after we swam this morning.
meanwhile, from Phil, who also sounds like he was in a crappy mood---didn’t a heavy front move over there too? Delusion Central
“
Well, we may differ here, Bob. I agree that a mistake in judgement on a news story that only embarrasses the newspaper and that particular editor (and reporter) may qualify for Christian charity. But I would not excuse dereliction of duty during a time of war (the war wasn't over), where the president might be the target of some southern sympathizer. Going across the street to get snockered while allowing a president - or anyone - to be murdered should have merited severe jail time, in my opinion. In Tunisia there is even some question of collusion of the two guards with the Islamists because Islamists had predicted what was going to happen on some internet based radio announcement. However, the Tunis police aren't exactly on the ball enough to monitor such things. That takes too much fucking effort. I think it more likely that no one at the museum or the Tunis police knew about the broadcast. The Tunisian guards just did what so many arabs do - took off because they felt like it. And the universal Arabic excuse for such neglect of one's responsibilities is always "mayselch" - meaning "it doesn’t matter." What one finds out, sooner or later, in Arab lands is that anything arduous or tedious, requiring focus and effort, and attention to be paid is nearly always blown off with a "mayselch." Wonder why Germany gets things done, and Arab countries don't? Germans pay attention and feel a sense of duty. Other people mock them for it and then wonder why Germans are successful and other people just slowly go down the drain. Americans used to be a lot like Germans. Not anymore. We're not nearly as bad as Arabs, but we are letting stuff slide all over the place with an attitude much like “mayselch."
-------
meanwhile tomorrow’s plan has shaped up---Portland early after getting Willow into the PEO ride super early in the morning
then visiting Ray Marcotte’s Dobrá tea shop and tea-ifying my life. Sprituality. In the pool this morning I wondered about doing yoga again and think I might call Will Haring next week to ask him about which yoga group in the region I might try. Darlene’s is a natural choice but it might involve too much chatting with George. Other class would involve meeting Karolyn Kinane.
In other words, don’t need to look up any of these classes.
night strange afternoon Aleve and sleep and now feel much better.
feels like I had a stomach flu for about five hours. Butt feels better too and feels like there was a connection.
Saturday night April 11
Day in Portland. Long drives but enjoyable. The constant play of light on the landscape.
Met Ray Marcotte at his tea shop. Fascinating visit catching up on his life story and the tale of the tea shop. He and Ellen met via Match.com about fourteen years ago. She is the eldest of two daughters of German immigrants. Her father, now 79, very active, was a cabinetmaker in NY state, Hudson valley or thereabouts? She went to UMaine at Orono. Forget what major if she mentioned. They both worked at Dartmouth’s library for a while. Gave me some comments about the attitudes there. Students are told to see their mission to “change the world.” I.E. world leadership on grand elite scale. Faculty very insular, closed society.
Dobrá started by three young men who segued it from having been a secret tea society into a post-soviet business. One quickly dropped out after designing the logo they use. Other two set up the tea sourcing and supply lines. So Ray gets all of his tea through the central operation in Prague. Franchise but they are looking for a better word. They pay a token fee per year to keep the name, stay connected to the supplies. Fifth year this year. Hope to make some money, so far are about breaking even. Both of them work other jobs. Ray as an online librarian until a few weeks ago, with Kaplan University network. Ellen as a web designer architect. “information architect” phrase Casey Bisson first used about seven years ago.
Kannerkreative.com
Ray spent thirty-one days in China on his first trip with/for the company. They went to lots of tea growing operations. Trip to Japan with Ellen was shorter. Korea too. Ray enjoyed China more, did not like how uptight Japan feels.
He still meditates and does yoga. Says TM is as popular as ever, even more so. Oprah and other stars now praising it. New batch of stars I guess. We went for lunch to a Chinese place they like---Empire Chinese Kitchen. Great.
Ray’s mother died two months ago. His father some years before. Ray is last of eight ? children. Oldest brother fourteen years older.
-------
Sunday April 12
Bright and sunny and crocusi open in the back.
Note from Ray with instructions
It was great to see you today. I would like to outline the best methods for brewing the two teas you bought.
Dian Lu Eshan - use 1 tablespoon per 6 ounces of water. Use water that is 80 degrees Celsius. First steep for 1 minute, second steep for 1.5 minutes, and third steep for 2 minutes. Be sure to resteep the same leaves to get all of the flavor out of the leaves.
Zhu Cha (gunpowder) - use 1 teaspoon (not tablespoon) per 6 ounces of water. Use boiling water and steep only once for 2 minutes. Gunpowder is a very high fired green tea so it requires much hotter water and a longer steeping time. And because it's high fired, it doesn't lend itself well to resteeping.
Let me know how you like the tea. Take care.
---------
Walked through campus earlier, taking photos right and left for the two women in Greece. Sofia and Natatakou? have to check her spelling. They were here 94-96.
Monday super warm and bright walked already. April 13
Love the book on Bataille. So well written and such important discussion of mystical experience vs language and its discontents.
I will allow myself to connect reading up on Bataille, the memories associated with it and going to see Ray Marcotte and connecting backward a little bit with what all happened twenty years ago, more of less. Somehow goes with the request from the girls in Greece, Natalie, for photos of campus. Natasha not Natalie. How could I make that mistake??
Natasa Koukoutegou and Sofia Sarafidou
Now that Connor is really helping me “get” Bataille, I don’t know that I an ever go back to Blanchot. I wonder if Lars Iyer really got the two of them or the crucial differences between them?
Night Scare in the garage after we walked in Tilton. Va headed in and I turned to the mailbox to pick up two books left on the trash can top by UPS. Va was holding onto the vertical grab bar on the door. As I looked toward her I could tell she was losing her balance and was going to fall. Terror. I could not get to her in time. I saw her bottom hit the ground and then her back and her head. She seemed ok and I propped her head on the books and told her to wait there while I called for help. I yelled over to Jeff Nielsen and his biking buddy but they couldn’t hear me. I walked half way down the drive to call again and Doug Grant backed out of his driveway. I caught his eye and asked him to come help. He stopped his car and got out and signaled to Jeff that he was going. He came in and helped me get Va standing. We went inside and sat for a few moments in the tv room and agreed we should go to the ER to get everything checked. We drove over and got a CAT scan. Jean the name of the woman doctor who we had seen there some time before. Results negative on all points. Va feels sore in her right shoulder, senses her left eye not seeing properly and will no doubt feel sore in the morning.
So. Bataille. Back to the inner experience.
Tuesday April 14 5:30 Laconia Eye satellite office here saw Va this afternoon. No damage or indications of anything awry to explain why she feels her vision is off, sees double or sees half-images. Hard to describe accurately. She is resting now, Aleve and on the sofa, listening to the last few minutes of General Hospital. Whistling for the cats.
Sunny sunny day. I got a good walk early on. Picked up some meds and stuff, self-diagnosing, for my legs. There are even homeopathic remedies for it--leg cramps at night that keep you from sleeping. Hmm, could be too much caffeine but we’ll try the magnesium and calcium and I forgot to look for some potassium but one mix may have some of that in it Also Krill oil. What about COQ 10 ?? Slippery Slope.
Tuesday night almost 7 thirty. Cool and sunny. Lazy morning, walk. Sending back the Izumi Pearls. Found the SocDoc website again and enjoyed his zeal for barefoot and went for a walk in the Lems and enjoyed them again. Gangemi also had a discussion about leg cramps that made so much sense and reminded me of having read all of this stuff years ago when running actively. He argues it is imbalance in the fats in the diet. Have to track his argument more carefully. But I fixed green chili stew with the hamburger in the freezer. He’s big on coconut oil too, so I munched a few slices of bread with coconut on it to see if all of that will help the leg cramps. We lunched at Panera and walked Lowes and came home for gouté. Va seems fine if still cautious about doing too much. She canceled Kathie’s pool workout today and Colin on the piano.
Saw Janice on the morning walk and got info on their kitchen remodel. Big event of the day was going to DMV to get my new drivers license. Easy as pie and no lines. Tax day and memorial for the Boston marathon bombing two years ago.
Sunday late afternoon
super gorgeous day. Pool not open, again, so we walked. Only about 2500 steps even though across the bridge and main street and back to the field house. Saw Robin and Joan Bowers.
Obsessing over the kitchen project and appliances etc past few days. Finally decided on Samsung group I think. Maybe some Bosch inserts? After further deliberation with all parties.
Phone chat with Phil on Friday or Thursday by chance, while Va was with Larson. He doesn’t sound so good. This move in with Peg taking far more of a stress toll than he had imagined. “As we age . . .”
April 19 Sunday night
Beautiful air all day and now.
Bataille: “For all the talk of summit and decline, ascent and descent, what Bataille describes is a labyrinth, the elusive labyrinth of being from which “no one escapes” and which is itself, remarks Denis Hollier, “impossible to circumvent, for reasons stemming from the economy of language” (Against Architecture, 71).
Remember how I wanted to title my dissertation the Labyrinth of Language? But Booth wouldn’t let me do that. Didn’t like it.
Bataille’s constant injunction: “We have to go further”---an injunction that continually exasperates all who would settle for the consolations of conclusion and closure. 127
Reminds me too of what Dad said a year from his death, about going on rather than just sitting down on the corner to wait. His legs and knees killing him. He could have sued the maker of those damn arch supports he wore all of his life for having ruined his feet and legs. And the doctors who had him wear them.
“effervescence” of mystical effusion vs Hegel’s order of rationality and law
Hegel never allowed himself the ultimate question, “the emptiness of intelligent questions.” “life life lived to the point of terror and a practice of joy that affirmed that terror and the “nocturnal spasms” it spreads. 136
Weds night April 22 eve of the Bard’s birthday
Nice day off. Sunny at the start. New toll plaza going south just opened today so I posted a facebook snap of the huge mill wheel in the entrance.
Walked on the ridge of Derryfield Park east of Manchester. Not at all what I had expected. Site it seems of the water works for the city. Old ski lift, dried cross country trails. One other guy wandering. One guy left as I arrived. Another arrived as I drove off. Wondered. Nice view across the valley to the far hills and mountains. Seemed very far. Wide river valley. Big river through Manchester. The mills. Couldn’t really see much. Woods thin, not that interesting. Rocky ledge everywhere, the top of the hill/ridge.
Lunched at Chipotle on South Willow. Cookie purchase at the Coop and later at Crumb and Cake. North main torn up for two years! Caffeineo bit the dust. Va and Gigi at the book group, John Allen talking about a famous lady spy from WWII.
Comment from the web this evening---could be a gloss on Bataille, especially the part I am now on near the very end about the search for life in the instant, free of all thought, all discourse.
“Didn't know I was looking for your site, but the interest I am taking in it tells me I was. Never knew this interest was so deep in me. I only got to page two so far. I’m 66, and this never happens to me! I thought I was no longer looking for anything. Thanks.” could be about any infinite number of topics----thanks internet for bringing us the world and confirming notions we never knew could be found.”
Thursday night
Surprise email joke from Ryan Hale. Good one too----
“I just got some junk mail from MyLife.com, telling me I have critical threats to my image and reputation via people hacking my information. It requires payment for me to root out the full identities, but they do provide first name as bait...Bob. “
And now turns out he’s on break and does want to lunch next week.
“I am on break next week and can meet you in Concord or Manchester for lunch wed. I realize Exeter is a haul.”
Nice surprise.
We met with Alan Mann this afternoon. Great talk about the remodel and he liked lots all of the new ideas. $35k > 40, just about what I expected.
Earlier with Melinda.
-------
Friday morning early --- cold and windy out
Night --- lunch at Consuelo’s Taqueria in Manchvegas and walking in Pheasant Lane and Hooksett Target. Cold and windy all day.
Saturday evening
“Culo veo, culo quiero.” Spanish proverb Va gave me to describe the way I respond to anyone’s news. Ran into Mark and Marla Okrant at Lowe’s. Did Facebook research later. Both are from CT. They just sold their house and bought a condo house at the Villages in Loudon. I was all set to do the same. They also vacation three months a year at Rincon on the western side of Puerto Rico.
Finished Connor’s book on Bataille. Superb but got tired of it too. As interesting as Bataille may be, he’s had his moment now and somehow we’ve all moved beyond where he was. He would be shocked and pleased as how much the world did catch up with him and then move way, way beyond him, from 9/11 to the internet. He had his prophetic function and the next generation, Derrida, took what he gave them and cashed in and cashed out with it. Now Derrida too has moved into history and who do we look to now?
Monday night April 27
Obsessed with the Okrants and their decision to move away, move to Loudon, the Villages. Should we be doing the same? Why are they abandoning us? Who are they? Who were they? What was their old house like? What did it sell for? 232k? or below? What are his novels like? He golfs. Probably I won’t like his novels. Even one. Even if it fills me in on tons of info about the big hotels. Drove past their old street, walked down the one parallel with it to see what sort of noise they would suffer from when the college kids get wild.
Is it envy of what others do? Anxiety that I am not choosing well, not capable of choosing well? Or is it anxiety that I might be forced to choose what they have just chosen? We drove to their place in Loudon. No way, Jose. What has possessed them? Much better to stay where we are for ever and ever rather than move to something like that. Like the Villages. From the first glance of the big sign just as you drive it---“Park Your Toys Here” ---onward, every details turned me off even while I was trying hard to acknowledge one could make a case. But this geography professor and writer has never seen the Barnes and Noble bookstore in Nashua! Yikes.
Today we swam. Nice to be back to our private pool.
Tuesday April 28 Waiting for Jason from Lowes to arrive at 9. Sure hope we can decide to go with Alan with no hitch. The sample of granite arrived yesterday and we’ve been looking at it. Florestal Verde by Sensa, Cosentino. Really does look like “living” stone! Well, now cut out from the living earth, a fetish sample, polished into high objectifiedhoodedness. (Bataille et al)
4:26 GH time and gouté. Long visit with Jason and Lorrie (from Duby construction). Lunch and then drive to gilford for Lowe’s walking. We were on edge a bit but after we decided to throw out the idea of the sliding glass door in the dining room, we settled on going with Alan. Jason and Lowe’s just too huge a constant committee meeting, it would seem.
night
Sent the break-off message to Jason. Va said, just say “thanks for the great work, unfortunately we’ve decided not to proceed with the project.” I didn’t even add “at this time.” To me it feels so cold and heartless and yet to Va it seems just what needs to be said and that’s that. 46 years of marriage and I’m just catching on. My mini-almost panic attack this morning during their presentation was a bit like the big one I experienced years ago when I feared for my life that Va was going to buy a condo up on Conway or some such place. Such an interesting life-long pattern we have here. Feel relieved we will work with Alan Mann and hope it goes well. Wise indeed to drop off the dining room project of putting in a sliding door and deck.
Ryan Hale not joining up tomorrow for lunch but we’re not surprised by that are we? He has to take his 11 yr old boy to have his teeth pulled as preparation for getting braces. Where shall I go then tomorrow? What shall I do? We’re going over to Windsor on Saturday to lunch with Jess and Helen and Ted.
Have I had enough about Bataille for a while? I think so. I can inch through Scott’s ms and have done with it.
Here is a great passage from Scott Merrill’s dissertation on p. 181
Individual’s are always walking between the sacred and the profane, between reason and the irrational, pain and pleasure, knowledge and “unknowledge.” This is why Bataille denies the equivalence inner experience and the ecstasy of the mystic: because the mystic’s goal is an impossible unity with the divine through ecstasy; it is impossible because a truly ‘inner’ or ‘negative’ experience cannot be fully realized. Philosophy or ‘discursive thought,’ is no help here because it is part of the world of profane work, “whereas inner experience ultimately derives from the sacred, a realm in which depense rather than production is the ruling principle.”
dissertation on p. 181
He is really doing it. A superb work it seems to me, now that I’ve been cramming and reading around in other books about Bataille.
Went to Nashua today for the day jaunt. Lincoln Park, along a river there (or canal?) right under the highway and behind the high school. Not pristine wilderness by any stretch, big power lines and highway noise etc. But still a well-used parkland with lots of trails. Will sure get buggy with those wetlands and the river. Later lunched on a steak salad at the Bugaboo Steak House. Four guys at the table over were live broadcasting a sports radio show for NH ESPN.
email from Jason said he found our decision to stop the project sudden and he hoped he hadn’t offended us. (Not surprising that he thought that?) Told him no, not at all, that it was a matter of changing our minds about what to do---visit grandchildren overseas or remodel etc etc.
As we drove up the street I saw Alan’s truck parked at Janice’s driveway and wondered why. I think she wants him to do a few tidying up things and so I suppose that since we’re a go he called her and said well I’m going to be around this summer across the street so let’s get that stuff you want done now.
This passage sounds like it could come straight out of Scott’s study of Bataille---or similar: “Masculinity is a perpetually unstable state, requiring constant re-affirmation. This affirmation is a performance specifically for an audience of men, to whom we prove and reprove our identity as proof of membership to the tribe.
Eroticism is the perpetual cycle of transgression, from contradiction to affirmation and back again, of our identities as they are encoded by the stereotypes of masculinity and desire.”
In fact if we take it out of “masculinity” and make it for both genders, it could be out of Bataille’s Erotism without change.
Be interesting to see if Lars Iyer in his second book on Blanchot, says anything about how and why Blanchot turned away from Bataille’s obsessions and developed his own, much more cerebral and yet literary ones. That collection of B’s obsessions might have something.
Wonder if M H Abrams ever looked at these guys? I doubt it, really.
Great quote from Phil
This is from Max Beerbohm:
"It distresses me, my failure to keep up with the leaders of thought as they pass into oblivion.”
Both Lars and Larry enjoyed this quote.
Jan sent news that Meyer Abrams died at 102 a few weeks ago. The greatest English major of the 20th Century?
Good swim this morning. Va got her corrections sent in to Temple.
Last day of the month.
Looking at Zillow I realize that their estimate of Okrant’s house was 188k and yet the asking price is 232k. So Zillow now says our house is at $205k and on that model we could ask maybe ? 240??
Paula told me about Jack Armstrong and Dana going through bankruptcy a while back (2007? or before). Now they live at the top of Tenney Mtn surrounded by trees. Dana has already put 100k down with Taylor Homes for her retirement there when she needs it, says Paula.
Gloria had successful cataract surgery on her only eye. Lost the other in childhood, her brother. Eleanor and Larry enjoyed the opera and theh book of mormon in nyc last week. Saw her at the store last night. Her walking looks a bit worse. Spirits fine.
Dave emailed us their Dates today. Arrive Philly July 16, Depart Boston August 21/22. Arrive up here around July 30.
Rupert’s “Salvage” has a very beautiful ending. I assume he’s thinking of his father but might be someone else?
There once was a time
when everything made sense
and there was a reason to be;
there once was a time
when it was just a scratch
and we would never bruise.
I would like to run right back
into the stories I heard you tell
and risk the things I don’t recall,
am prepared to do anything
that would bring you back.
All these years gone and I
still don’t know the words for love
or how to grieve and let you go.
It is never ending, this cycle
of love and loss, drink and despair.
I am back at your door, belong
to you. Don’t argue, rescue me.
Boyhood Island snaps into focus around 210 when Karl drops the rock on the car and is in love with Anne Lisbet. Beautiful passages there and he conveys that terror in between his dropping the rock and his parents finding out from the driver’s phone call a week later.
No comments:
Post a Comment